


Tallahassee, Baby: A Collection of Swanfire Prompts

by steelneena



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Multi, Swanfire Prompts from Tumblr
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-06
Updated: 2017-05-04
Packaged: 2018-03-21 15:11:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 6,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3697010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/steelneena/pseuds/steelneena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Swanfire prompt collection from tumblr.</p><p>Includes Swanfire Sunday and Tallahasse Tuesday prompts as well as any random prompts I may receive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Happier Ending

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt by eevylynn: Could you write any of the EF scenes from the finale where Neal is alive and goes back with Emma instead?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (so I accidentally misread your prompt, and I wrote this instead, because I actually haven’t seen the whole episode. So once I’ve done that, then I’ll rewrite some scenes as if Neal went back with her and not Hook. So Sorry).
> 
> (Filled 10 months ago)

The words rang mockingly in her ears, sing song and bitter. He died a hero. You can’t take that away from him. You have to drink the potion. You have to forget everything I just told you. Rumple had flung her away, such a look in his eyes, and raised the vial to his lips, and she had seen nothing more. As she burst through the door to Granny’s feelings mixed, happy to see her family, and loath to see them without Neal, she steeled herself for the moment. Everyone was inside, chatting, happy. There sat Henry with his Grandparents. Emma rushed towards them, pulling them into a hug filled with days of desperation and loneliness. 

“You mean we’re staying?” Henry said, and she pulled him to her, holding him close. 

“We’re not going anywhere,” Her words rang true in her heart, and she felt the tears overflowing her eyes. 

“Well, that’s good to hear. If you were leaving, I’d be mighty disappointed that you didn’t say goodbye," 

The voice filtered from behind her, and she stilled in shock. A cold shiver ran down her spine. Emma turned, petrified, to see Neal, hale and healthy, standing behind her. His hands were in his pockets and his smile curved halfway to his ears. 

"Surprise, I guess,” Emma’s mouth opened and closed in shock before she rushed to him, throwing her arms around him. So many things could possibly be wrong in the world as a result, but she didn’t have the heart to care. 

“Neal, oh God, Neal,” Her hands drug through his hair and she buried her face in his neck, molding her body as close to his as possible. 

“We were trying to call you to tell you, Emma. Neal woke up from his coma right after you left,” David said, smiling. “I guess everything is right with the world again, huh?”

Yes, Emma though, her nod barely noticeable as she held Neal close. Yes. Everything would be alright.


	2. Stay a While

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from greenstar910: Portland-era, Neal and Emma deciding to stay and work together after they met.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Filled 10 months ago)

Neal watched her with tender eyes as she swung back and forth in the carousel seat, contentedly sipping at the last dregs of her long cold coffee. Their conversation had dwindled into the early morning hours and just beyond the fence, Neal could see dawn on the horizon. 

“We’d better get headed out, Emma, the fair opens in two hours,”

“God, is it that time already?” She stifled a yawn and he couldn’t help but crack a grin at her. 

“Yeah, I guess it is,” They both stood, laughing and stiff, and headed towards the gates. Neal shut down the carousel. 

“And so ends the magic, huh?” Emma asked, and Neal stiffened habitually at the word. 

“Doesn’t have to end. You could always offer to give me a ride back into town before you take off with my car,”

“Your car! Ha. Your stolen car,” She kicked her shoes against the dirt, slowing her brisk walk. “I guess I could give you a ride, back into town. But no further!” She wagged her finger at him exaggeratedly, and gave him a mild glare. 

"Well, I’m not asking much, so thanks for that,”

“Thank you, by the way,” her demeanor suddenly became shy. “It was, um, it was the nicest evening I’ve had in a long time,” He stuck his hands in his pockets, and bumped her shoulder with his. 

“You know, I could teach you all about the tumblers, some time, if you like,”

“Oh yeah?” She looked at him, mock-skeptically. “That sounds like a lot more than just a ride back into town,” He smiled wistfully, closing his eyes and facing towards the rising sun.

“You never know, I think we might make great partners,” Emma smiled at his words. 

“You never know,”

When they got back into town, she didn’t kick him out of the car.


	3. A Chance Meeting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prompt from swanfireheart: While in the past, Emma runs into Neal in the Enchanted Forest and falls in love with him all over again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Filled 10 months ago)  
> Okay, so I’m taking this prompt with a grain of salt, considering that Neal wouldn’t have been in the Enchanted Forest at the time, so let’s just pretend that he’s a dimension hopper or something, idk

They were in the woods when the hooded figure raced past her and Hook, swiping Hook’s saddlebag as he went. He was fleet-footed and raced and dodged through the forest as he ran, as natural as if he were a deer. While Hook shouted, surprised and confused, Emma had promptly begun to race after him, hauling her skirts up around her legs. 

“Stop! Get back here, thief! That’s my saddlebag!” She called as she ran. 

“No it’s not!” Hook shouted from behind her indignantly. Emma paid no heed, watching only where she took her footsteps and the shadowed figure in front of her. She watched with hawk eyes as he veered towards the right, making to go around a tree, and took her chance. She went right, and, by a hairsbreadth, came out in front of him, grabbing his cloak with her arm. 

The thief pulled up short and his hood fell, leaving his face unobscured.

“Neal?” Emma’s breath left her, as she looked at the thief with wide eyes, mouth fallen open in shock.

“Pardon?” He asked her cheekily. Emma only shook her head, trying to right her thoughts. 

“Give me back the saddle bag,”

“Who is Neal?”

“No-o one. He’s no one. You just look a lot like him,” Emma saw his dashing smile and his shining eyes and felt like her 18 year old self once more, pleasantly surprised by the charming thief all over again. 

“Well, M’lady, he must be a lucky fellow to hold such standing in your heart. I’ll not encroach upon you any longer,”

“He…” she lost the word ‘died’. “He’s been lost,”

“You will find him again. Hope, and believe. If you do that, you cannot fail,” he made a small bow. “M’lady,” and dashed away into the forest. Emma watched him go, stunned into silence.

“Did you catch him?” Hook had finally made his way to where she stood. 

“Yes,”

“So where’s my saddle bag?” Only then did Emma realize that he’d never returned it to her. She smiled broadly. 

“He got away with it,” She replied, and then turned, walking back to the horses. 

“That makes no bloody sense, love!” Hook ranted behind her, but Emma didn’t care. She could fix it. She could fix everything. She could find Neal. She could bring him home.


	4. Death is the Road to Awe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anon prompt: songfic, Death is the Road to Awe

He would not die. He would not leave her again. He would not allow it to happen. Everything in a flux meant that anything could happen. Anything. It was that sort of strange in between state which even allowed him to be existing at all, in any respect or manner. He supposed he wasn’t the only one. Others might be like him, having died in the future, wondering if the past might just change that forever, but if there were, he could not see them. 

He watched her with Hook, and he though, maybe, maybe if he was actually still dead, he could be happy for them. There was so much memory there, though, and so much hurt. If he had a chance…He’d promised her that he would never stop fighting. 

He’d be her Tallahassee, somehow, that was, if he could figure out how to be alive. 

Of course, it was weird when you existed somewhere outside of time, everything happening at once and very slowly at the same time. Like a Black Hole. 

He frowned when Hook didn’t get Emma’s references. They’d watched Back to the Future together. And Star Wars. Those were their memories, happy memories, ones born of a time that was as honest as it was dishonest, as true as it was untrue. 

And more than anything, he wanted to be in Hook’s place. 

More than anything in the world.

_He died a Hero. Don’t take that away from him._

Yes, well, he didn’t want it handed to him on a platter either. Maybe, he thought, he could be corporeal if he tried hard enough, figure out a way to stop his Papa from downing the draught. Maybe. 

Or he could become corporeal enough to pop through the portal and then he’d be alive again anyways and- 

No. That was definitely not possible. 

Maybe…

* * *

Emma’s hand still clasped the wand, and she made to drop it, Rumpel only just about to let go of her when she saw a flicker in the background. A flickering image of - 

No. She was sure it couldn’t be real. He couldn’t be there. He couldn’t possibly be there. 

_The future is a blank page, dearie._

When Rumpel let go, she only looked into the sad, wide eyes gazing back at her, mouth forming her name. 

Calling silent. 

Calling still. 

_EMMA._

Screaming. 

Unwittingly, she had taken the wand with her. 

Perhaps, if it could redo magic, it could undo as well. 

Perhaps. 

Perhaps. 

She would find a way. 


	5. A Particular Yellow Bug

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anon 'A' Prompt: the history of the yellow bug (cuz I see some and then I get feels)

Neal had been tailing the guy for at least a week days. The goal was the car, of course. Rich guys always had really nice cars, and Neal needed something, anything. Nothing was worse than sleeping on a park bench, and the most recent run of bad luck was starting to take it’s toll on him. It was getting colder and he wasn’t sure exactly what month it was anymore. It could start freezing overnight and he would wake up with frostbite on his nose before anything could be done about it. So he’d picked a mark, watched and waited. 

The keys were finally in his hand though, and all thoughts of frostbite had left him behind. He’d also lifted enough cash to make sure he was gassed up for long enough to keep him going. He had about twenty minutes before the guy got back - every day, at the same time, he took his dog to the park for a half hour. He opened the door to the garage, and-

No Mercedes. What the hell?!

Instead, there only sat an old, beat up, yellow bug. 

“Shit,” he worried his lip around, before stepping back in the house. It was getting later, and he had to make a decision fast. It would be obvious that he’d broken in, no matter what he did, and Neal couldn’t really afford to wait any longer, nor to find a new mark. 

He looked on the key holder, hanging next to the backdoor, returning the Mercedes key, and swiping the one to the bug. 

Anything was better than nothing, he reminded himself as he started up the old thing. Neal pulled up his hood, opened the garage door, and pulled out, before zooming speedily away. 

Anything was better than freezing to death. 

Little did he know, that the little yellow bug would lead him right into the fairytale tragedy of his future.


	6. Call My Name

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anon prompt: Emma goes dark. Mary Margret and David thought that it was because they’d been told she had the potential for it, before she was born, but what they failed to understand is that everyone has the potential for great darkness under the proper circumstances. While trying to save Emma from the darkness, they discover just exactly what the cause was: the loss of her true love, Neal/Baelfire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven’t seen any of OUAT past Quiet Minds. But I decided to take on this prompt anyways. I guess, from what I understand, Emma hasn’t actually gone dark, but Mary Margret and David stole a baby? or something. That’s pretty fucked up. Anyway, I liked this prompt and decided to go with it. So I have no idea if any of this even remotely fits in with the show where it is right now. Whatever, and enjoy.

_If you ever call my name_  
 _I'll come running,_  
 _When your sorrow wings in pain_  
 _I'll be there,_  
 _If you ever feel a change in your weather_  
 _Take shelter with me here,_   
_My Dear_

\- Ryan Bingham  _Snow Falls in June_

* * *

 

“We have to stop her!” Mary Margret shouted, Emma’s unbridled power was a swirling vortex in the air. It sparked uncontrollably, and the Charming’s staggered under the onslaught. To the other side, Killian was making his way towards her, sure that if he could reach her, the magical storm would end. Belle struggled to stand, and Regina held Henry tight, providing a barrier from the overflow of power. 

“Emma! Please!” David begged his daughter, but she was insensible to his plea. Killian reached out, caught her arm and-

The explosion that resulted blew all in the vicinity back several feet. As they made to stand, Emma still was swathed in a cloud of magic, and she was the eye of the storm. They’d barely made any headway towards her when Rumpelstiltskin appeared only a few feet from her, but not near enough to touch. 

“Tisk, tisk dearie. You shouldn’t have touched her,” He spat at Killian, though he never took his eyes off of Emma. Even dark, her power was a blanket of white sparks and mist, and her eyes held an unearthly sheen. This was what happened when a powerful sorcerer or sorceress went untrained and unchecked. They failed to control the magic, rather, the magic controlled them.

  “Help us, will you, you utter arse!” Killian fairly bellowed, though it came out only as a spoken sound over the din. All the same, the Sorcerer just ignored him, focused on Emma. Her parent and the other turned to look at her once more, surprised utterly by what they saw. While she had earlier appeared malicious and full on intent, she had fallen to her knees, tears falling from her eyes. Her mouth was open, moving, but under the raging storm about her, the words were lost. 

“Yes, yes you are Emma. Your parents didn’t understand what they were told,” Rumpelstiltskin replied to her apparently able to hear her words, as he walked steadily towards her. 

“You are good. You were born of true love, and while that does make you powerful, it is not your inherent power which gives you the potential for great darkness, nor does it make you inherently evil. No, your parents have gotten that wrong. They’re missing one crucial factor in all of this. You, dearie, are having a magical breakdown. It’s been building up but you’ve kept pushing it down and away. All these years, you’ve been blocking your emotions, but you magic is tied to your emotion, and now that you’ve started using it, it has no outlet for what’s happened to you. Regina is a perfect example on a smaller scale. She went dark for the same reasons you have, my dear. Evil is not born, it is made. And in your case, it all results from one moment. The death of your true love,”

The collective gasp was lost to Emma’s rending scream, her hands thrusting out in front of her, spewing magic forth in glowing, gushing streams. 

“Baelfire is gone, Emma. You must let go of him!” Rumpelstiltskin plead with her. 

“No!! No! I won’t, I won’t. I need him!”

“He is dead, Emma, Neal is gone, Baelfire is gone! You must let him go! For your own sake!”  He’d inched closer and closer to her as he’d spoken, and now he was close enough to reach out to the woman. It was obvious that she was terrified past the point of sensibility, her own power was positively ripping her to shreds, and if Rumpelstiltskin didn’t find a way to end it soon, it would kill her before it had the chance to take her over and mold her into something so dark they dared not speak her name. 

A heartrending scream tore from her throat when his grasp was merely an inch away from her wrist, and a different sort of explosion, this time more controlled, occurred between their proximity. Between Emma and Rumple stood a ghost-like figure. He was grasping Rumpelstiltskin’s arm, forcing him back with sheer power, a look of total and complete apathy upon it’s face. No emotion crossed it’s features, not even within the eyes. It pushed the Sorcerer back with ease, and away from her before disappearing without ever making so much as a sound. 

“Neal,” Emma gasped out, and the collapsed entirely, unconscious.

“What the hell just happened?” David asked picking himself up off the ground and running towards where his daughter lay sprawled. 

“Emma, happened,”

“Yes, we can see that. Care to explain?”

“She was never evil You misinterpreted. You were told that she had a capability of great evil. This was a display of unfettered magical force. Her emotions rule her magic, because she’s untrained. That, coupled with the right circumstances, are the reason you were told what you were,”

“So, losing Neal is what caused this?” Mary Margret asked reasonably. “They were true love?”

“So it appears. It’s inevitable. The emotions have been building in her since he died. If I’d have known…” He trailed off. No one had known, not really. Belle coughed. 

“I knew. The necklace, he had the swan pendant with him back in the Enchanted forest. The only way it could have come through was if they had true love,”

“It’s a little late to be telling us that, love,” Killian interjected, but it only earned him a glare. Ignoring him, Mary Margret continued. 

“So what was that things that pushed you away?”

“In her fear, I believe that Emma called up a shade. Shade’s wills are bound to their creator. Whatever Emma wills, it will fulfill. A shade is simply a reflection of a soul, in this case, the soul of my son. He is caught now, between death and life, bound to an intermittent realm, completely without his own agency. Emma was insensible. I believe she was trying to bring him back to life, simply out of fear for herself. The magic was tearing her apart, and she sought the only protection she could think of. Emma cannot be blamed for this,” He concluded with finality. However scarring it had been to see such a dark, half representation of his son called into being to protect Emma bodily, he had to continue putting up a strong front until the issue could be sorted.  Killian once more made to move towards her, but Rumble held him back with a gesture. 

“I wouldn’t touch her if I were you, dearie,” He warned, and thankfully the pirate took it to heart. If they hadn’t the past between them, Rumple would almost have felt bad for the man, so incongruous as the discovery was that deep in Emma’s heart, she still yearned for another. 

“So how do we fix this then?” David spoke up once again. 

“With extreme care and difficulty. Charming, you might be able to touch her. if so, we should get her into a hospital bed, so she can be monitored. Essentially, your precious daughter has put herself into a magical coma.  No human can have that amount of magic run through their system safely,”

David approached her prone form tentatively, and managed to pick his daughter up, cradling her close, without incident.  "I guess I should be thankful that I can touch her at all,“

"So the issue here is Neal’s death?” That’s why she’s gone dark?“ Regina was holding Henry close. "But I’ve been getting better, I haven’t been…it’s been easy not to be dark with Robin around. So, does Emma have another true love out there?” She asked. 

“It doesn’t quite work that way, dearie. You should know that better than most,” He looked closely at Killian. “No, I don’t think Emma has that option. In her fear of her ultimate destruction, she reached out for Bae to protect her. In trying to raise him from the dead, the only choice her magic had left was to create the shade,”

“That isn’t possible. To raise the dead!” Mary Margret was indigent. 

“Yes, isn’t it though?” Rumple asked imperiously. “Malificent, Zelena, August….why not my son?” He asked the crowd rhetorically. 

“I resent that you find the love that Emma and I have to be inconsequential,” Killian hissed at him, clearly hurt. 

“You tried to touch her, and that made it worse. I’m merely making an observation. She called to him in her moment of distress. That’s telling,”  
They made it to the hospital without incident. David laid her on the bed in the room to which they had been escorted. 

“Now what?”

“Now, I bring her out of her magical coma. Henry, if you please act as a conduit. I’m fairly certain that, though your grandfather is able to touch her without issue, you will work better, considering that you are a part of her, and a part of Bae. You will touch her, and then I will touch you. Emma won’t feel threatened in the manner, and we won’t have to worry about the Shade,”

Henry, who had been silent the whole time, came to the bed besides his mother, and sat, inching onto the edge, before placing his hand to her face, gently caressing his mother’s cheek. Rumple placed a hand on his grandson’s shoulder, and felt himself be pulled into that place where the Savior had safety ensconced away her consciousness. 

* * *

“Mmmm. No, I don’t want to get up yet Neal. This is nice,” Emma snuggled into her lover’s chest, reveling in the feeling of his embrace.

“Then don’t get up, babe,”

“Why’re you poking me then?” She grumbled at him as best she could. 

“He’s not poking you. I am, Dearie, in a fashion," 

Here eyes flew open, and she clung tightly to Neal. 

"What are you doing here? How did you…?”

“Get outta here, Papa,” The Neal her mental landscape had conjured spoke in tandem with her thoughts. 

“Emma, please. Neal isn’t here,” He stated softly, using his son’s chosen name, however unfamiliar it felt on his lips. “You have got to let him go. You’ve pulled him into a half state, without a will, without thought or emotion. That isn’t a life, Miss Swan, and you must fix what you’ve done,”

“What? No, Neal’s right here! Neal’s right-” She turned to look at the place where her imagined Neal had been. Emma  grew hysterical watching as the world she had created disintegrated, leaving her grasping at Neal’s form as he turned to smoke. “No!” In was a wretched sound.

“Neal is dead, Emma,” She backed away as he advance upon her. “Wake up, Miss Swan. You cannot protect yourself this way forever. You have your son- Neal’s son - to think about,”

“He isn’t dead!” she sobbed. “He was right here until you came and magicked him away!”

“He was never here, my dear. He never was. He died in your arms, Emma. Remember it. He died in the forest, in your arms, with eyes full of love you you. You held him in those moments when he passed from this world,”

Around them, the empty space that had been left when her former fantasy disappeared, had remolded itself into the scene of his son’s death, Emma, holding Neal, just as she had those months ago, that day when he had left their world. 

“Neal, no,” She looked down upon his features, contorted with pain.   
“You have to let me go, Emma,” Neal flinched in his dying throes. “I’m gonna watch over you, but you need to let me go,”

“I love you,” It was the only plea she offered. 

“I love you too,”

With that last utterance, the scene completed, his son breathing one last breath, and Rumpelstiltskin was thrown forcibly out of Emma’s mind as the illusion crumbled into reality. 

* * *

Emma choked back to consciousness, Rumple and Henry stumbling back from her to a safe distance. She was gasping, crying silently at the trauma she’d just endured, but it didn’t appear as though she was about to spout sparks again. Killian, in effort to comfort her stepped forward, but thought better of it. 

“Only Henry should be able to touch her safety,” Rumple explained. “I planted the thought of him in her head. Grandson?” He prompted the boy, who wasted no time in going to his mother, who pulled him close. Even at thirteen, he could put up with being cuddled by his mother, especially when she so desperately needed him. “No one else is safe for certain. Not until we can figure out how to get her to recall the shade without forcing her magic out of whack again. This is a very, very tentative moment,”.

“What are we going to do?” Regina asked, level headed. 

“We’re going to get the Author to bring back my son,”


	7. Change of Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: My second [swanfire] prompt: a song-fic! It’s called Change of Time by John Ritter -A

_I had a dream last night_  
And when I opened my eyes  
Your shoulder blade, your spine  
Were shorelines in the moon light  
New worlds for the weary  
New lands for the living  
I could make it if I tried  
I closed my eyes I kept on swimming  
(rough seas, they carry me wherever I go)

 _  
-_ Josh Ritter _, Change of Time_

* * *

It wasn’t often that they were able to find a room, either by legal means or otherwise. More often than not, they were forced to use the less than legal means, slipping in through barely open doors, in between maid’s rounds at less than fabulous motels. 

This, was one of those times. 

Neal shot up, shivering, but also sweating, and shaking, not just from the cold, but from the emotions and from the adrenaline. Emma lay on her side,facing away from him. The moonlight flooded in from a crack in the blinds, and it lit upon the cream and silk expanse of her back and shoulders, exposed to the stale motel air. The sheet ended just above her hips, allowing him to view the landscape of her body. In effort to calm himself, he let a finger trail feather-light down her skin, leaving goosebumps in his wake. 

This, this was his future, and the dreams were old and dusty relics, the nightmares that had crept into his soul and never left. Emma’d seen them happen before; he was more vocal in his terrors some evenings than others. This evening, however, his lover hadn’t budged. He matched his breathing to her own rhythmic patterns, and his heart eventually fell from a canter to a walk, pounding far less violently. 

He went to rub the sleep from his eyes, only to find that he’d shed tears at some point.  At his lowest points, Neal would always wonder to himself how long they would last. How long before she was gone from his life, and he from her memory. Everything he touched, it seemed, broke, died, deserted him. He was a cancer, a poison, and he had to be cut out. 

It was rare that he’d crashed that low since he’d take up with Emma, but with the dreams came the darker thoughts, the years and years and years of torment that he’d endured in Neverland, the abandonment by his father, seeing his friends murdered on a field of battle where only child soldiers were left to fight. No, his only solace was in her. His only future, of any bright quality, was a future with her in it. The only good dreams, were the ones in which she smiled at him, an endless loop of staring into her blue pooling orbs, and seeing love reflected there, and concern and hope. Emma was the only star left in his whole sky. The light by which he was guiding his ship, sailing home. 

Neal leaned forward and pressed a lingering kiss to Emma’s fair skin, just below her neck, between the shoulder lades. She rustled the sheets with gentle movement, but did not wake. Exhausted, Neal rested his head on the pillow, burrowing his face into the cushion of her golden hair, taking in the scent of it like a balm on his soul. One of his arms draped itself over her bare torso, and pulled her close, hanging on for dear life. His guiding star, his anchor, as his ship was tossed about the storm. Emma was warm and real. Emma was there, and the dream faded back into memory, and his seas quieted, lulling him back to slumber.


	8. Only You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for 5.05 Dreamcatcher inspired drabble in two parts. Henry talks about his father, and Emma remembers. Later, when Emma's mistake causes a rift between her and Henry, what lengths will the dark one go to, to regain his love?  
> May become a part of a larger 'verse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since the show seems to be taking their characters directly from Disney movies now, I figured that I'd take their Rapunzel and add a little something. Someone had to!

The moment Henry said the title, melancholic look in his eyes, Emma could hear the refrain echoing back at her from across the years. It wasn’t that she hadn’t thought of  _him_ , on the contrary, she spent a good portion of her time creating the dreamcatchers thinking of him, despite the only association being the actual thing and not her intention behind creating them. It was almost as if the curse itself had grown attached to Neal, fond of his memory in a terrible and twisted way. But she could only think on it objectively. Rare moments, generally when surrounded by the dreamcatchers, induced her to tears.

First Rumpelstiltskin and now herself. Emma Swan. Both of them had loved the boy the was Baelfire and the man that was Neal Cassidy. Both had been and were the Dark One. It was curious, she though objectively, how strongly the curse  _pulled_ and  _pushed_ and  _prodded_ at her whenever anything even vaguely reminded her of him. 

 _Only You_ was no exception.  His smile, a drifting vision in front of her, his glinting mischievous eyes, his soft touch, gentle and tender. 

She blinked slowly, allowing herself to come back from the memory, returning to her conversation with Henry. 

“It worked on me,“ 

And so it had. 

Later, when she returned home, Emma strode purposefully to her shed. The dreamcatchers there held many memories.   
Perhaps, it was time to make some new ones.

* * *

 

Henry hated her. She could feel it tugging at her, incessantly. But she had to fix it. Somehow. Anyhow. Emma sifted through all of the new inhabitants and locations which had come over when the curse last reversed, and lit on one person, relatively lone and forgotten among the growing number of people in town. 

Rapunzel had come over. Though Emma had never met her, she remembered hearing vaguely some tale from David about the dark haired beauty. Once, during her and Henry’s time in New York, they’d watched Tangled, and, if things with Rapunzel followed the route other fairy tale characters had, then, perhaps, there was hope. 

The Dark One teleported herself away, though it was already grown late. She didn’t even wait outside the door, appearing directly at the princess’s location, and once again, reappearing at her final destination of the cemetery. 

“Dark One!” Rapunzel’s voice tremored. 

“Can your tears truly return the dead?” She asked bluntly. The other woman looked shocked. 

“Y-Yes,” Rapunzel’s confusion was evident. “But no one knows that. No one!" 

"Good. let’s keep it that way,” Emma replied. With a motion of her hand, Neal’s casket burst forth from below the earth. The lid flipped open at her whim. Neither woman looked, Rapunzel for fear of what she’d see, and the Dark One…her intentions were an unintelligible storm.

“Heal him,” She uttered, emotionless. 

“But it has to be your tear!” Rapunzel cried. “I don’t know him, and it required emotion to bring someone back. Deep and pure. I can do the song, but it must be your tear and that emotion must be true,”

With another wave of her hand, a Dreamcatcher appeared. 

“I’m ready,”

Neal’s dying, shuddering gasps in perfect audio played lightly before the Dark One as Rapunzel began to sing.

Slowly, a tear loosed from Emma’s eye, and dropped onto Neal’s hand, the only part of him she had exposed to their sight. As Rapunzel’s song ended,the skin there smoothed away the branded scar, and the decay of death, spreading outwards across his body in a sheen of golden light. Both women held their breath. His body shimmered, reformed, his cheeks flushed and….  
His chest rose and fell, gently, shakily. His eyelids flickered. 

“Oh thank-” Rapunzel began, but her exclamation fell into a shriek when Emma withdrew a knife, and took the pommel end to the resurrected man’s head, knocking him unconscious with a sickening crack. A trickle of blood ran from his hairline. Emma turned to Rapunzel. 

“Now, remember, you will tell no one of this, or face the consequences. I don’t think I have to explain to you how severe you will find them,”

The princess nodded to the Dark One, shying from her threatening gaze. Emma teleported Rapunzel back, and then sent herself home. 

Soon, someone would find Neal, or he would wake and find someone else. But she hadn’t been about to risk him seeing her. The Dark One didn’t need her family to know. Henry could guess, and then, he would forgive her, without implicitly realizing that she’d done the deed for his forgiveness. To make him happy. 

Yet, deep down, Emma knew that she hadn’t done it purely for those reasons, to regain Henry’s lost affections. As she entered her home, Emma hummed the tune from earlier that day, absentmindedly, thoughts already returning to her other plans at hand.


	9. Camping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prompt from agent-doggett from tumblr for Tallahassee Tuesday: Neal and Emma spend the night in the woods. Portland Era.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My prompter doesn't actually know anything about OUAT, so this was both fun and interesting.

Neal had been gone all day, and Emma wasn’t sure why. He’d dropped her off at their usual meet spot that morning, claiming some surprise or another, and hadn’t been back. She’d been to the library, window shopped a bit, and lounged around the coffee shop for a hour, when she spotted the bug coming around the corner. A bounce in her step Emma, crossed out onto the curb, iced coffee in hand, and waved her boyfriend down.    
****

From within the car she could see his wide smile. Neal pulled to up, and stuck his head out the window, like an oversized puppy.

“Hey babe! Get in, I’ve got a surprise for you!” He called, reaching over to pop the passenger side lock. She slid in, clicking her seat belt and redoing her pony tail all in the same fluid motion. 

“So what’s the surprise? She asked, bouncing in her seat.  He laughed carelessly, his excitement compounded by hers. 

"Well, I had to go to the store - I know, I know…but I really wanted this for us. I think you’ll really enjoy it,”

She could always tell when something reminded him of the past. It was a symptom of her circumstances, and his, and all the children in the system that they could recognize in others those same feelings they had also experienced. And she knew that look. She wore that look. The pain ran deep, but if there was one thing Emma had learned about Neal, it was that he took every opportunity to remake the bad into the good. 

It was a rare day that Neal drove the car - only when he wanted to do something special without telling her. After their first date, they’d somehow settled into a routine. If they had to drive a night - really late at night - Neal took the shift so that Emma could sleep, especially if they’d been driving all day. Any other time, unless she said otherwise, he always took the passenger side. And Emma had found that she liked it. She made decisions, which turn, which town, and he didn’t question them, because she was ‘his compass in life’ or some deep shit like that. He read too damn much. 

“Neal, where the hell are we going?” She asked, genuine curiosity boardering on frustration. 

“You’ll see,”

“All I see are trees,” She shot him a dissatisfied look. He glanced at her as he turned off the road and into the grass. 

“That’s the point, Emms,” The car went a little ways further, just under the cover of the trees, before Neal put it in park and turned the key. “We’re going camping!" 

"Camping,”  

“Is there a problem with that?” He asked, hand suddenly on the key again. “We can do something else, I just thou-”

“No, camping’s fine,” She backtracked quickly. “I’m just surprised. You don’t seem like the camping type,”

He shrugged in response, but Emma could see the deeper meaning, lurking behind his normally cheery facade. She decided not to press it. Whenever she tried to hide something, he never pushed either. It was something that they’d mutually agreed on, despite never saying a word. They’d only been travelling together for a month, and neither had volunteered a lot of information beyond what they’d exchanged on their first date. 

Emma rolled up her window before exiting the car, Neal following suit. He popped around the the trunk and pulled out a sleeping bag. 

“Surprise! I thought you’d like a little security while we sleep under the stars,” He held it out to her. “You like?”

“It’s great! And we’ll have it for in the winter,” It was the first time she’d mentioned what they both feared. The bug’s heating was touch and go for the most part, and the winters could be brutal. 

“So you don’t mind that I spent some money on it?” He asked. Emma was surprised. 

“No, I don’t mind,” The blonde wracked her brain. Where could he have possibly gotten the money? Last they’d totaled they had $15 dollars between them and that was strictly for food and gas use. 

“I mowed a lawn this morning to pay for it. I made forty-five bucks, and the sleeping bag only cost fifteen, so we’ve got a little extra in our food and gas fund,” As he filled her in, Neal continued to pull things out of the trunk. “Alright, let’s set up camp,”

* * *

It was a gorgeous night, the summer days were unbearable but that evening was perfect. It had grown late and the fire was crackling away. Shadows cast on their faces, dancing, and made their eyes gleam. They both lay on top of the sleeping bag, looking up from the clearing at the stars. 

“This is great,” Emma’s sleepy voice wafted through the night, mingling with the forest sounds. “I’ve never been camping before,”

“I used to do it all the time,” Neal sat up very suddenly, taking a leaf from the ground and toying with it, almost absentmindedly. He avoided her gaze. “I never had a sleeping bag though,”

She waited for him to say more, not daring to speak. 

“When I left, at first I was alone, on the streets. I didn’t have anywhere to go camping, even if I wanted too. I think I’d have done better, if there was, but I made do. Then, this family took me in. And it was great for a while… I… Well it ended and I was back on my own. I camped every night. Every night I looked at the stars, memorizing constellations, drawing them on rocks. They were the only familiar thing I had left,” He tossed the leaf aside.  "I haven’t camped out since just after I ran from my first foster family,“

"Well, I think we should do this for a while. While it’s still warm out. I think I kinda like it,” Emma sat up, resting her hand on his back, the other arm around his front, hugging him from behind. She pressed her nose into his hair, and nuzzled.

“Show me the constellations?” The whisper tickled the tousled hair around his ear. Neal glanced back at her, a small smile growing on his handsome face. 

“I’d love to,”


	10. “I’ve been buying the wrong underwear,”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A prompt from an anon on tumblr, who asked for a prompt off of a numbered list: “I’ve been buying the wrong underwear,”

Neal looked up from his files at Emma’s words, the door slamming behind her. She looked supremely harried, and he suppressed a smirk.

“Okay. I’ll bite. What’s up?”

“Apparently it’s the wrong shape for my ‘assets’,” She finger quoted at him sarcastically, and let her keys drop with a clatter onto the counter. Her hands began to gesticulate wildly. “How was I supposed to know that underwear is classified by the particular angle of my hips and roundness of my ass?”

That time, Neal was unable to suppress a snort.

“You think this is funny?” She asked him, in all seriousness. “I just got chewed out by Red, who somehow thinks that I’m doing myself a disservice by not following fashion guidelines I didn’t even know existed. It’s not like I’ve got anyone to impress, so why should I bother?”

“Hey now!” He exclaimed with mock hurt. “What does that make me?”

“I already impressed you, you don’t count. That’s why I said I don’t have anyone to impress,”

He stood close in her bubble. She didn’t move, but watched him, wary all but for the sparkle in her eye that showed she knew he was still putting on an act. Neal leaned in close, bumping his nose to hers.

“Doesn’t mean I might not appreciate it,”

“In your dreams, lover boy!”

He threw back his head and laughed before turning his back to her and swaying his hips.

“Do you think I should ask Ruby if I’ve been wearing the wrong underwear too? Obviously I haven’t impressed you enough yet…”

She slapped his ass fondly before gliding past him into the other room. Over her shoulder, she called out. “Couldn’t hurt!”

“You wound me, Emms!”

“You know you love me!” Her voice was faint from within one of the other rooms.

“Yeah,” Neal said to himself sitting down at the table again. “Yeah I do,”


	11. Extreme Attention Getting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A happy moment. Drabble length.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 38: “You fainted…straight into my arms. You know, if you wanted my attention you didn’t have to go to such extremes.”
> 
> Audrey and Cooper are my current, but it’s such a swanfire thing, so I wrote swanfire it instead.

 

When Emma opened her eyes, Neal was staring back at her. There, in the corner, she could see the twinkle there, the mischief that she knew came when he was about to say something particularly annoying. She narrowed her eyes.

“Are you about to sass me? Because if you are, you’re sleeping on the couch tonight,” 

Neal threw back his head and laughed. “You fainted...straight into my arms. You know, if you wanted my attention, you didn’t have to go to such extremes,” 

Emma punched him in the arm. 

“I did not. And I wasn’t going to get extremes,”

“Are you saying that you were trying to get my attention because-”

“No! You doof!” But her annoyance, as always, was full of love and her tight lipped look turned to a fond smile. “You’re such a pain Cassidy,”

“I’d be more of a pain if I had let you fall,” He replied without so much as a pause. 

Emma faked hurt, letting her mouth fall open. “I can’t believe...sassing me! In my own home!-”

“And in front of your own son, no less,” Emma turned to see Henry watching them. Neal had glanced over at him too. Neal’s smile glowed on their son’s features. 

“Ha ha kid, very funny,” Emma replied as she sat up. “Now, can one of you do me a favour and get me some water? That spell must have really taken it out of me,”

“You bet mom,” Henry was already in the other room as he replied. 

Neal smirked. “Hell of a kid we’ve got, huh?”

“Yeah, babe,” Emma smiled, a soft light in her eyes as she looked at Neal. His features were warm and open and tender. She loved him with her whole heart. “We do. We sure do,”


End file.
